Midnight Tides (Malazan Book of the Fallen, #5)

by Steven Erikson

Honour is not a thing to be chased, for it, as with all other forces of life, is in fact impelled, streaking straight for you.

Perhaps that is the truth of madness, when a mind can do nothing but make endless lists of the mundane tasks awaiting it, as proof of its sanity.

I now fear getting depressed.’ ‘The risk of achieving what you wish for,’

‘Destiny is a lie. Destiny is justification for atrocity. It is the means by which murderers armour themselves against reprimand. It is a word intended to stand in place of ethics, denying all moral context.

The Tolls are the roots of our civilization, the fibres reaching out to infest everything. Everything.’ ‘What is your point, Finadd?’ ‘You are cleverer than that, Acquitor. You understand full well. That heart feeds on the best and the worst in human nature. Exaltation and achievement, ambition and greed, all acting in self-serving concert. Thus, four facets of our nature, and not one sits well with constraints on its behaviour, on its expression. We win not just with armies, Seren Pedac. We win because our system appeals to the best and worst within all people, not just humans.’

Coin is the poison, after all, and it infects indiscriminately.’